Safety device for railway vehicles with pneumatic tires



March 26, 1935. A. J. MICHELXN Y 1,995,575

SAFETY DEVICE FOR RAILWAY VEHICLES WITH PNEUMATIC TIRES Original Filed Nov. 10, 1930 Patented Mar. 26, 1935' V SAFETY W NB M HQII ES A a Andre Jules Michelin; Paris, France, assignor-"to Michelin 'et Cie, Clermoiit' Eei'rand; Franca'a] corporation of France Application November 10, 19a;shanghai. l

Renewed April :4, 1932. In France November, 1 I

21, 1929 7 l Clairn.

My invention has for its object a safety device for railway vehicles the wheels of which are fitted with pneumatic tires.

Said device is intended to avoid any. damage to the fish joint bolts or other projections such as are ordinarily associated with the rails or tracks that might'occur as a consequence of the abnormal running of the wheel in the case of the pneumatic tire becoming deflated.

The device according to the present invention also avoids, when the tire is punctured, any damages to the tire and to the wheel that might result therefrom.

According to invention, arigid' metallic frame is secured to the car axles or to the car frame, said rigid metallic frame carrying atits ends skids or rollers which are adapted to slide or roll on the rail. When the wheel is running under normal circumstances, said skids or rollers are suspended at a certain distance above the rail, for instance 5 or millimeters. If, on thecontrary, for some accidental cause .(such as the bursting of a tire) the wheel happens to subside, this subsiding is limited to the 5 or 20 millimeters that have been above referred to, since the downother projections and the damaging of the wheel and its. pneumatic tire. The skids or rollers may" also fulfill a guiding function if they are provided with guiding surfacesalong the inner side of the rail. It is possible, as shown in the appended drawing, to fix a supporting frame to each axle. But a single supporting frame could also be fixed to two axles, in which case the nume ber of skids or rollers would be reduced.

With the foregoing and other" objects in View,

the invention will be more fully described in connection with the accompanying drawing which is illustrative only, and is semi-diagrammatic in that no attempt is made to give the parts their actual mountings and relative proportions but only to show their locational relations.

Fig. 1 is a lateral view of a safety device according to my invention showing a supporting frame provided with rollers adapted'to roll on the frame in case of thetire becoming deflated.

a rail'and a portion of avehicle showing the tire pressure.

Fig.2 is a 'similar view showing a supporting I 7 frame provided with skidsinstead of rollers;

.Figure 3 is a vertical transverse section through improved device.

1 5 Y The vehicle frame is shown in '5, and 4 is the ,axle connected to said frame through suitable springs. The wheels .2 are fittedwith pneumatic tires 3.

".To the axles 4aresecured supporting frames 6 10 carrying at-their ends either rollers 8 (as shown 1 in Fig. l) or skidsf'l (as shown inFig. 2), said rollers or skids being normally suspended at a certain distance'above rail 1. In the case of the pneumatic tire getting punctured, said rollers or 15 skids come in contact with the rail and help in supporting the vehicle frame;

Referring more particularly to Figure 3, the pneumatic tire 3, which travels on the rail 1, is

shown as mounted upon'a rimv 9' carried upon 20 the wheel in the usual manner; and this rim supports a guidefiange' 10 which projects down at the inside of the rail 1 for the purpose of re-f taining the Wheel or tire 3 upon the rail.

The adjoining rail sections are connected to-' 25 gether by the fish platesll and 12-secured to the j rails by the bolts 13 which are provided with bolt heads 14 at one side and nuts 15 at the-other side.

When the pneumatic tire becomes deflated 30 through puncture or loss of air -pressure,'a condition' arises which is ordinarily not met with in' metallic railway car wheels, in that the guide fiange 10 isallowed to descend into contact with" the heads 14 of thebolts 13 holding the fish plates J g I upon the sides of the rails. If allowed to do so, the guide flange 10 may shear the heads 14 from the bolts thus allowing bolts 13 and fish plates 11 and 12 to become loose and to jeopardize the safecondit'ion of the road bed, or they may ride of the car or derailment of the car itself.

The improved frame carrying'the rollers 8 is provided to avoid this hazard, the rollers 8 con-. 5 I tacting with the rail head 1 before the guide not limited by the specific details as shown but up upon the projecting edges of fish; plates or I other projections either with damage to the wheel 15 e by guide the vehicle upon the rail projecting lat-o j with respect to the .heads of rails of m'odern standard railway tracks connected together :by laterally projecting fish plates and bolts and Ithat it is subject to many and all structural vacomprising a pneumatic loadfsupporting' tire 'engaging the rail'head and a wheel retaining flange the axis of the. wheel when the tire is deflated projecting radially beyond the-tread of the'tire as engaged withthe rail head'sufiiciently t o nor-,;.

mally engage'the side of the railhead and therea "railway, vehicle wheel.

erally from the rails intoits plane of movement but below the side of the rail head, but which flange is liable upon deflation of the pneumatic tire to be projected in its plane to an abnormal distance beyond the tread of the tire as engaged with the rail headandthereby to strike said ob-' structions in its pathway; together witht means for limiting such abnormal projection of the flange :beyond the tread of thetire to a degree within that at which it may strike said obstructions in its pathway, said means supported from the vehicle projecting radially a fixed distance from and: adapted to react from the rail head.

' g ANDRE: JULES MICHELIN. 1 

